


Our Lives Worth Fighting For

by breathewords



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: 2.21 is begging for post-eps, Angst, Post-2.21, all the cliches, but everyone did, i shouldn't have, post-episode, so here's mine
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-15
Updated: 2018-05-15
Packaged: 2019-05-07 05:50:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,791
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14664602
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/breathewords/pseuds/breathewords
Summary: "Sometimes if something’s meant to break, it’ll break.” Post-2.21.





	Our Lives Worth Fighting For

Archie takes an almost imperceptible step toward Betty as FP’s knees hit the ground, Jughead still lifeless in his arms. Even with all the rage that’s been building inside of him, with every pushup he’s done in the hopes of getting stronger to take down the Black Hood, every failed attempt at heroics, every second he spent trying to impress Hiram Lodge, Archie has never felt so useless.

Sure, he and Jughead have been at odds more often than not as of late. Between the leather and the tattoo and the drug running, the image of Jughead-the-kid-he-grew-up-with, his brother, has been fading slightly, dying in his memory. But now, as everything implodes around him, that’s what he sees, right there in the forefront of his mind. Jughead as a kid, climbing the ladder into his treehouse. Holding hands with Jellybean on the Andrews’s front steps. Devouring a burger at Pop’s. Sharing comic books. Playing with action figures. Chasing him around the playground. Playfully pulling Betty’s pigtails.

Betty. Next to him, she looks close to passing out herself.

“Betts,” he says, unsure how to comfort her. There’s no fixing this.

She’s halfway to Jughead and FP, hands clenched tightly into fists, knuckles white, when she stops, runs a hand through her hair, streaking it with blood, and turns around. In her eyes, Archie sees her as a kid, too. Reading a book. Teaching him and Jughead how to tie their shoes. Crying when Polly didn’t want to play house with her. Racing him to school. Smearing pink icing on Jughead’s cheek.

She’s paralyzed, begging him to help her move one way or another, begging him to do _something_. He closes the space between them and pulls her into his chest, the feeling of her in his arms more familiar and familial than anything else. He leads her a few steps away from the chaos that’s finally erupted around Jughead’s body. He can’t watch any more than she can.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” Toni whispers repeatedly under her breath.

“Someone call 911!” Cheryl yells (again).

Archie hears the unmistakable sound of metal on metal and knows someone, surely Sweet Pea, is rhythmically kicking a trashcan. He holds onto Betty like she might fall apart, but truthfully, he’s the one in danger of shattering. She’s the one who pushes away from him and makes her way back over to the Jones’s with steady footfalls. Archie lurches back to her side, and when he looks into her face, he expects to see her hysterical. Instead, she kneels down, knees pressed together like the lady Alice raised her to be, and ghosts her hands over Jughead’s battered face.

Archie is the one who crashes unceremoniously to the ground, head in his hands, tugging on the roots of his hair, chanting _why, Jug, why_ , over and over again like a madman.

“That’s my boy,” he hears FP say. “Wants to shoulder every burden at once. He’d light himself on fire if he thought it would help someone else. Fucking masochist.”

“I don’t think anyone’s coming to help,” Cheryl says. “We’re gonna have to get him to Riverdale General ourselves.”

By the time they make it, Archie, FP, and Sweet Pea are all covered in Jughead’s blood and the place is practically overflowing. Betty had led the way, head held high like a queen ascending to her thrown. Regal. Composed. Not for the first time, Archie marvels at her strength. And then, at her fury.

“Excuse me,” she says politely to the first nurse they see. “My boyfriend needs help.”

“Alright, ma’am, someone at the front desk can take his name, and a doctor will be with you right away.”

“No… no… we need someone now.”

Archie hears her voice rise an octave and tenses. He’s got Jughead in a fireman’s carry, but he turns him over to FP and Sweet Pea because he can tell something apocalyptic is about to happen. Call it best friend’s intuition.

When the nurse’s reaction is not to Betty’s satisfaction, he sees her ball up her fingers and pull her arm back, ready to throw a right cross that he knows is packing more power than one might expect from a 16-year-old blonde in a pastel sweater.

“Betty!” he says, lunging forward to pin her arms to her sides.

He grabs her from behind, and it’s like someone flipped a switch and replaced Betty Cooper with a frantic banshee.

“Someone help him! He’s dying! He’s fucking dying! He’s gonna die!”

She crosses some line from just frantic into completely hysterical, screaming incoherently and desperately trying to escape Archie’s hold. She’s kicking and trying to free her arms and twisting her neck and torso, but somehow (thank you, wrestling), Archie maneuvers them into a sitting position against a wall in the hallway as he watches a pair of doctors lift Jughead onto a hospital bed and roll him away. As soon as he loses sight of Cheryl’s hair as she whips around the corner, hand in hand with Toni, Betty goes still in his lap. Her eyes are closed, fists clenched, knees curled to her chest like a small child as her arms wind around his neck.

“Hey, Betts, don’t worry. He’s with the doctors now. They’re gonna fix him up.”

He feels her nodding, loosening her grip on him, sliding to the cold, tile floor next to him, and he feels like a liar. Jughead could be dead already for all Archie knows. He looked like a fucking slab of meat when FP carried him out of the forest, more bruised skin than not, giant gashes in his clothes, limbs hanging at unnatural angles.

_What the fuck happened to him?_

He sits next to Betty, wracking his brain for what Jughead could have been doing while he and his father faced down a killer, but comes up empty except for a vague image of Jughead staring down a group of Bulldogs or Ghoulies or whoever else tried to get in his way and dispels it quickly. He can't think about it. They stay on the floor (all the seats in the waiting room are taken, he’s sure) until Cheryl, Sweet Pea, and Toni rejoin them.

“They’ve got him in surgery,” Toni says. “Want anything from the vending machine?”

They don’t. The minutes tick by slowly, like thick honey coming out of a small spout. Like a maple tree leaking sap in the cold. Like the blood drying on Archie’s letterman jacket, not for the first time.

Fred and Alice show up, both looking a little worse for the wear. They’re all family, in whatever twisted ways. Betty flinches away from Alice, residual fear in her limbs but an apology in her eyes, and Alice understands. Betty has suffered a lot at the hands of both her parents, not just her psychopath of a father. Alice sits next to FP instead, clutching his hand in hers, but not making eye contact. FP slowly turns his head to the side and relaxes a fraction of an inch into his chair. Fred tries to get the attention of a doctor or a police officer, using kind eyes to explain his “son” was brought in an hour ago, persuading people in a different way than FP can.

Cheryl and Toni sit huddled in a pair of chairs, eyes flashing around the chaos of the hospital, halfheartedly looking for someone they might recognize. Honestly, Cheryl doesn’t really care who else shows up in the hospital. She’s here for her weird little family, and them alone. Toni, her girlfriend. Betty, her Blossom cousin, who she now shares an even more twisted bond with. Archie, who’s always been kind to her, despite her cruel nature. She doesn’t care much for Jughead, but for some reason, she feels wrong leaving.

Toni bows her head, pink locks falling in disarray over her shoulders. She looks up every now and then, scanning for Serpent jackets, but only sees Sweet Pea and FP. She tries not to think of Fangs. Tries not to think of Jughead. Squeezes Cheryl’s hand like it’ll squeeze life back into her friends.

Sweet Pea sits across from her, against a wall in the waiting room, methodically fiddling with his pocket knife. Part of him, the weak part, the part his father tried to beat out of him, feels bad for being cruel to Jughead earlier. He was the one who told Jughead that he got Fangs killed. That he got them mixed up with the Ghoulies. Blamed him for all the Serpents’s problems. He knows Jughead well enough to guess at what he did in turn. Handed himself over to the Ghoulies in an attempt to right his wrong. He’d like to think he would have done the same thing, if the price on his head was as high as the one on Jughead’s.

Another part of him is still unimaginably furious with Jughead for not _doing better_. Not being able to save Fangs, despite his best efforts. When he joined the Serpents at age 13, FP was a hero to him. He could do no wrong. _That’s_ what a leader should be. Not some emotional teenage boy with a Northsider girlfriend and a good vocabulary and nothing but one drug run under his belt. But Jughead is still his brother, so he holds his vigil nonetheless.

Archie paces the waiting room, constantly musing his hair, nervously tugging at the cuffs of his jacket. Eventually, he sheds it all together. He’s joined by Veronica, who of course went to Betty first, only to find her efforts at consolation would be for nothing.

Betty sits up straight in her chair, ponytail slightly off center but otherwise looking like she could be sitting in class, staring down the hallway where they took Jughead, seeing and hearing nothing else. She will not be consoled.

Eventually, a doctor finds their group amid the masses, and tells them that Jughead is in critical condition, still on the operating table. The doctor offers no other update before she rushes away. Everyone is too stunned to attack her with questions.

Betty stands and uncurls her firsts for the first time that night and blood splatters the floor. When Alice grabs an antiseptic wipe and tries to clean her daughter’s hands, Betty pulls them closer to her chest, turns around, and lets a single sob fall from her lips. Then, she sits back down and refocuses her gaze on the hallway.

Fred takes up Alice’s seat next to FP.

“You don’t have to stay,” FP says. “Who knows how long…”

He can’t finish the sentence.

“We’re staying,” Archie says, subconsciously walking over to Betty.

He claims the recently vacated chair next to her and puts and arm over her shoulders. She doesn’t blink, doesn’t look at him, but doesn’t resist his touch. Maybe it’s because he’s the only other person in the room, save for FP, who can even come close to what she’s feeling for Jughead.

Veronica, uncharacteristically, sits on the filthy ground in front of Betty, and tries to place her hands on Betty’s knees. Betty tugs her legs up so violently, she almost kicks Veronica in the face. No one but Archie tries to touch her after that.

The clock continues to tick. Friends and family filter in and out of the hospital. The fires outside burn on.

Jughead’s doctor makes an appearance again, this time looking more like an angel and less like an angel of death. Maybe it’s because of the news she shares.

“You’re the father?” She says, more composed this time, looking at FP.

He stands and nods solemnly.

“Your son’s stable, but he’ll need to stay for observation. He’s still pretty heavily sedated, anyway. He’s in Room 6 with a nurse. She’ll be able to tell you more.”

FP takes a step forward with Alice and Betty at his heals.

“Family only beyond here,” the doctor says.

FP doesn’t miss a beat.

“They’re family.”

Alice disappears into Jughead’s room right away, probably interrogating the nurse. FP tells Sweet Pea and Toni in no uncertain terms to go back to the Whyte Worm and stay there with the reserves. They don’t even put up a fight.

“Thank you,” he says to Fred, and the two old friends embrace.

“If you need anything else…” Fred says.

“We’ll be back tomorrow,” Archie promises.

FP turns to join Alice.

Betty leans forward, and Fred hugs her first.

“You too, Betty. You know you can always call us if you need anything. We’ll see you tomorrow.”

Her arms come up and she squeezes him back, quickly but surely. She lets Archie and Veronica hug her together, burying her face in their shoulders, trying to block out the world that’s crumbling around her. When they pull away, she feels empty. She waves goodbye and steels herself before walking into Jughead’s room.

He’s got an IV in his arm and a breathing tube in his mouth. Bandages around his head and stitches visible on his face and arms. A cast on one leg. She tells herself it could be worse.

 _He’s alive._ She feels a little more steady at the thought and manages to grab he mother’s hand as the nurse starts rattling off Jughead’s ailments.

 _He’s alive_ , keeps playing on repeat in her head, keeping her on her feet and in the room. She knows she should be listening, but that’s really the only thing that’s important to her right now.

“Whoever attacked him did a pretty good job. Probably thought they left him for dead,” the nurse is saying.

She sees FP stiffen, a cold fury in his eyes, and knows there will be hell to pay for the Ghoulies. Knows there’s violence in his future, no matter what Jughead tried to do to prevent it.

“Like I said, the internal bleeding was the most troubling, but now that that’s under control he should heal nicely. Doesn’t mean he’ll be comfortable for the next week or so, but you should be able to bring him home within the next few days.”

“You’ll both stay at our place, FP,” Alice says. “He needs a nice bed.”

“Alice…”

“I’m not being vicious, FP. It makes sense. What are you gonna do, put him on the couch?”

Betty tunes out their fighting and walks over to Jughead’s side.

“Jug,” she says, lips falling open for the first time in hours. He remains still, except for the rise and fall of his chest, which eases something that’s been tearing at hers.

She gingerly takes a seat on his bed, painstakingly trying to get as close as possible without jostling him. By the time the nurse, who’d been gathering supplies onto a tray, notices, she’s wedged herself next to him on her side, ankles and feet hanging off the bed, arms pulled into her chest.

“Sweetie, you can’t be on there with him right now,” the nurse says gently.

“Let her be,” FP says.

He and Alice manage to stop bickering for a minute. The nurse leaves. In the instance of quiet, Betty falls asleep. 

* * *

 “I wish they’d never met,” she hears FP whisper as she slowly comes back to her senses.

“It’s Riverdale. Doesn’t matter what part of town you live on. Everyone knows everyone.”

“I know. Just… it’s hard to love someone that much. I don’t know if it’s worth it.”

“Is that what happened with us? It got too hard to love each other?”

“It was never hard to love you, Alice. It was just… sticking around for shit like this. We couldn’t be there for each other like this.”

“Think it would have been worth it? If we tried harder? If we weren’t so selfish?”

“Yeah,” FP sighs.

“I think so, too. I hope it is for them.”

Betty opens her eyes. It’s pitch black in the room. She goes back to sleep.

* * *

 It’s 4 a.m. when FP finally relents and agrees to take a walk to go grab a tray of coffees from the hospital cafeteria. He’s loathe to leave his son’s side, but Alice was persistent in her insistence that even a quick walk would do him good.

She promised to watch over Jughead. So she does. She stands at the side of his bed opposite from where her daughter sleeps, mercifully still. She even goes so far as to take his hand, trying to rub some blood into it as the sedatives leave his system. She’d like him to wake up soon. That’s really what would be good for FP. To look into his son’s eyes and know definitively that he will get through this.

She can’t imagine what kind of state she’d be in if Betty were the one hooked up to all the machines. Betty, the only good thing she managed to do in her life. And really, she fucked that up, too. She’s not a good mom. She tried. She tried so hard. She tried to give her girls a good life, a life of fluffy pillows and fresh baked cookies and family dinners. A life different than the one she had. Instead, she abandoned her eldest, pushed her middle daughter away, and left her baby girl alone in a house with a serial killer.

She doesn’t much care what happens to Hal. She never loved him, anyway. She loved what he was able to provide her. A safe, comfortable life. Something FP could never give. Something Jughead can't give Betty. Lately, she hasn't been able to remember why it was something she wanted. Looking down at Jughead's swollen lip and blackened eyes, she remembers.

Alice runs a hand carefully through Jughead’s hair, still matted with blood. She tried to hate him. She tried to hate him for being FP in miniature, for bringing Betty into a life Alice was running from. But when someone loves your daughter so much, you can only push them away for so long. Maybe that's why her heart lurches when he starts to stir.

“Jughead? Jughead, it’s Alice. Can you hear me?”

“Betty?” He asks right away.

“Right by your side.”

He tries to turn to look at her.

“Don’t try to move, you’ll pull the tubes.”

He manages to look down at himself and moans softly.

“Do you want me to get a doctor?”

He nods.

“Okay, I’ll be right back. Your father should be around any second. I just asked him to step out for some coffee, but… he’s here. He’s here for you.”

When she comes back in with a doctor, Betty is on her feet gripping the side of the bed, visibly taking deep gulps of air.

“Can’t get rid of me that easy, Cooper,” she hears Jughead joke. His voice is quiet and obviously pained, but it makes Betty smile just the same. 

* * *

 The steady beeping of some sort of machine. Blood drumming in his ears. The distinct smell of latex and hand sanitizer. A comforting hand in his hair. These are the first things he registers as he rejoins the world not with a bang, but with a whimper. And with an unlikely bedside companion. Not his mother, but a mother nonetheless.

“Jughead? Jughead, it’s Alice. Can you hear me?”

Her familiar voice and name snaps him right back into reality. He wants to sit up. Wants to rip the needles out of his skin and run far away. To find Betty. To make sure she’s okay. To make sure that his sacrifice wasn’t for nothing. But he didn’t sacrifice himself. He’s no martyr. He’s still here.

All he can manage is, “Betty?” and then a series of grunts and moans he tries to stifle for her sake while he waits for Alice to get a doctor. He wakes her anyway.

She comes to with a start, placing a hand on his chest right away. He can’t help the scream that comes out. His ribs are on fire.

“Sorry! Oh my god, I’m so sorry!”

She throws herself out of his bed and he tries to tell her he’s fine through gritted teeth. He regains his composure quickly, still in pain, but used to masking it. She holds on to the rail of his hospital bed and cries.

“I thought you were dead, Juggie. You can’t do that to me! You can’t just tell me you love me and leave. You scared me half to death, damn you!”

“I know, I know,” he says over and over again while she cries. “I’m sorry, Betts.”

“You could have gotten yourself killed. You tried to.”

She’s right. He tried, and damn near succeeded. It scares him.

“Can’t get rid of me that easy, Cooper,” he jokes. Sardonic humor comes naturally to him, even when he’s only half alive.

She seems to soften toward him a little, and then they’re interrupted by Alice and FP and his doctor, who thinks her comforting doctor voice might distract him from the fact that she’s prodding him in the ribs and pulling needles out of him and making his whole body ache.

“Do you need more pain medicine, Jughead?” She asks.

He squeezes his eyes shut and shakes his head no. He just wants to get out of here. He wants her to leave so he can ask his dad what happened with the Serpents. So he can explain himself to Betty. So he can make sure no more of his friends have died because of him. Everything becomes too much all at once, and he wishes he never woke up. A traitorous tear runs down the side of his face.

“Take the meds, boy,” FP says, and then an IV is re-inserted in his arm and everything feels a little duller around the edges.

He keeps his eyes shut as the doctor chats with his father. He feels Betty rejoin him on the small cot and is thankful, at least, for her.

“Is this okay?” She asks. “I’m not hurting you?”

He slowly opens his eyes. She’s glowing, shimmering around the edges. It’s probably the meds.

“I love you,” he says.

“Elizabeth,” Alice says. “Why don’t we go home and change? We’ll come right back,” she adds, seeing Betty’s defiant expression and adding a meaningful look at FP for emphasis.

“Okay,” Betty concedes. “See you soon,” she tells him.

He nods, and then he’s alone with his father.

“Jughead,” FP says, voice laced with emotion. “Don’t you ever…”

FP hangs his head and shakes it, searching for the words.

“Not everything is your responsibility, Jug. I know it feels that way sometimes. Trust me, I know. But you have a responsibility to yourself as well. And to your family.”

“I know. I just can’t get it right.”

FP sighs for the millionth time that night, understanding exactly how his son feels and knowing he’s not going to get through to him, not now, maybe not ever.

“I love you, Jug. I’m glad you’re okay.”

It’s a lot of emotion for the Jones’s, and FP is almost glad when Jughead just nods and lets the drugs pull him under again.

* * *

The next few days are a blur of weaning off pain meds and stitches accidentally tearing and bruises blooming in new places mixed with visits from Archie and jokes with Sweet Pea and literary references with Toni and an awkward side hug with Cheryl and Betty, Betty, Betty, Betty.

She doesn’t leave his side, and he doesn’t want her to. She’s the only thing he’s sure of, the lightest part of his life. He learns that there’s more than one reason she’s not going home. That her house is a crime scene swarmed with reporters from all over New York. Thankfully, the news of Hal’s arrest dies down quickly, as all things do.

Jughead is granted release from the hospital, and Alice wins the fight about where he and his father will spend the next few weeks.

(Between Alice and FP, she won easily after a lingering kiss and confession that she’s afraid to take Betty back to that house all alone.)

He negotiates his way onto crutches after a doctor tries to wheel him out of the hospital in a wheelchair, but after making the short trip from the Cooper’s driveway to Betty’s bed, he’s fighting off pain and wishing for codeine again.

“Take a shower, dear,” Alice tells Betty as she lingers in the doorway. “FP and I will get him settled.”

After a moment’s pause, Betty seems to decide Jughead is in capable hands, and he hears her faucet sputtering seconds later.

He lets his dad be a dad for now, closing his eyes as FP arranges Betty’s pillows for him and leans his crutches carefully against the wall. Alice disappears and reappears with two mugs of tea and sandwiches on a tray, which she deposits on Betty’s comforter, breaking all her rules about eating in bed.

“You need anything else, boy?”

“No thanks, Dad.”

“We’ll be right downstairs, then. Painkillers are on Betty’s desk, if you need them.”

Then, Alice and FP disappear, closing the door behind them. That’s how he knows his life has truly taken a strange turn. Alice closing her daughter’s bedroom door, leaving him alone in her bed.

Betty emerges from the bathroom in a cloud of steam, wrapped in a plush robe and smelling like a thousand flowers.

“Our parents left?” She asks.

“Mercifully,” he says, and she leans down to kiss him.

For a second, the pain diminishes.

“Need a shower?” She asks, eyebrows wiggling suggestively.

“Unfortunately, I think shower sex is off limits for the foreseeable future,” he says, gesturing up his body, from the cast on his leg, to the gash on his upper arm, to the impressive row of stitches above his eyebrow. 

Betty frowns.

“Whose fault is that?” She asks.

“Mine, I guess. Went and got myself beat up by 30 gang members who hate my guts.”

“Why’d you do that?” She asks seriously, propping herself up on one arm next to him.

“To right what I put wrong with the Serpents. To keep them, and you, and everyone else Hiram and Penny and the Ghoulies will tear down on their warpath safe. It was my cross to die on, Betts.”

“Not everything bad is your fault, Jug.”

“I know,” he sighs. “At least, I’m trying to know. Sometimes it feels like it is.”

She nods, gives him a beat, before asking, “What really happened, Jug?”

He recounts the story. Putting the pieces together and realizing Hiram aligned himself with Penny and the Ghoulies. Calling him up and making the counteroffer, his life in exchange for an end to the violence. Building up the courage to throw the punch he thought would end his life, thinking of her the whole time.

“God,” she says. “Veronica and Archie can’t have known about this.”

“I don’t think they did,” he says. “Archie’s done a lot for Hiram, but I still don’t believe he would have gone along with anything like this. Same goes for Veronica.

Anyway, it was all for nothing, I’m sure. You heard anything about the Serpents? My dad has kind of put a gag order on gang talk, I think until he thinks I can handle it. But Betty, if something happened, please, just tell me now.”

“No, Jug, nothing bad. The fight didn’t happen. You held the Ghoulies off a little longer. FP says nothing major has happened yet in terms of land or anything else, but he’s got the Serpents at the ready. No one is happy about what the Ghoulies did to you.”

“This isn’t how I meant this to end up,” he says, frustration clear in his tone.

“I know,” she says. “But… we can’t control everything, Jug. Sometimes if something’s meant to break, it’ll break.”

She pulls her knees to her chest and rests her chin on them.

“Not us,” he says, rubbing circles on her back.

Her hands are curled in fists against her shins, and he pushes himself up against her pillows to unfurl them. He kisses her palms, taking them back to forever ago in a booth at Pop’s.

“Not us,” she agrees. “I don’t know what I’d do without you. Sometimes… sometimes it feels like if I can’t see you I’ll die.”

“Yeah, I know the feeling. Unmoored,” he repeats.

“Unmoored,” she echoes.

“We’ll be okay, though,” he insists.

They both evaluate his words, turning them over carefully like the investigative reporters they are. Eventually, Betty looks up and sees Jughead looking down at her, eyes bright despite being rimmed with cuts and bruises. She relaxes into him, really relaxes, for the first time in god knows how long, and they decide he’s no liar. They’ll be okay.

**Author's Note:**

> For some reason, this came out of me from Archie’s perspective first. Trying to put a new twist on post-2.21 fics, I guess. Don’t know if I really succeeded, but did my sacred duty to the Bughead fandom by writing a post-ep, anyway. Hope you enjoyed :) 
> 
> Title inspired by Santigold lyrics.
> 
> I’m well aware that, “Can’t get ride of me that easy, Cooper,” is a cliche. Sue me. 
> 
> One comment = one prayer for Juggie.


End file.
